According to the NPS
Historical Handbook, "Edgar Mills, a Sacramento businessman,
served as master of ceremonies and introduced the Rev. Dr. John Todd of Pittsfield,
Mass.,
correspondent
for
the
Boston Congregationalist and the New York Evangelist. Dr.
Todd opened the ceremony with a 2-minute prayer, while telegraph operators
from Atlantic to Pacific
cleared the wires for the momentous clicks from Promontory. At 12:40 p.m.,
W. N. Shilling, a telegraph key on a small table in front of him, tapped out:
'We
have got done praying. The spike is about to be presented.' "

David Bain notes that Reverend Todd composed a travel memoir which included
some very general
recollections of the Golden Spike ceremony, but which does not include the prayer:
The
Sunset
Land:
or,
The
Great
Pacific Slope, Boston: Lee & Shepard, 1870.

Also by Rev John Todd is California and Its Wonders, T. Nelson and
Sons, NY 1884, 208pp., and the brief article "Completion of the Pacific Railroad"
in The
Normal Fourth Reader, by Raub, Albert N., et al., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania:
Porter and Coates, 1878, 1884.

Edson T. Strobridge found that the High Road to Promontory, by George
Kraus, American West Publishing Co., 1969, p. 274, ¶2, describes
the events as the crowds were gathered for the driving
of the gold spike ceremony including the prayer given just prior to the
laying of the last
two
rails
and the formal opening
of
the ceremony.

The Rev. Dr. Todd, of Massachusetts. Offered a dedicatory prayer:

Our father and God, and our fathers' God, God of Creation and God
of Providence, thou hast created the heavens and the earth, the valleys
and the hills; Thou art also the God of mercies and blessings. We rejoice
that
thou hast
created the human mind with its power of invention, its capacity of expansion,
and its guardian of success. We have assembled here this day, upon the
height of the continent, from varied sections of our country, to do homage
to thy
wonderful name, in that thou hast brought this mighty enterprise, combining
the commerce
of the east with the gold of the west to so glorious a completion. And
now we ask thee that this great work, so auspiciously begun and so magnificently
completed,
may remain a monument to our faith and good works. We here consecrate this
great highway for the good of thy people. O God, we implore thy blessings
upon it and
upon those that may direct its operations. O Father, God of our fathers,
we
desire to acknowledge thy handiwork in this great work, and ask thy blessing
upon us
here assembled, upon the rulers of our government and upon thy people everywhere;
that peace may flow unto them as a gentle stream, and that this mighty
enterprise may be unto us as the Atlantic of thy strength, and the Pacific
of thy love.
Through Jesus, the Redeemed, Amen.